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Placebo Effect?

I've had the flu since Easter so my big 30 Day Shred is on hold until I'm fully recovered...
Last week I was up coughing pretty much all night for four straight nights. I tried cold and flu medicine and all sorts of cough medicines, but nothing was helping. By day five I was feeling pretty awful and sleep deprived when I saw a post on Facebook saying that if you put Vicks Vaporub on your feet, it will cure night time coughing. I was pretty skeptical and felt really stupid for even considering anything I saw on Facebook, but I was desperate. I asked my husband to stop for some on his way home so I could try it.That night, I put the Vaporub on the bottom of my feet and covered them with socks at 10:00. I went to bed at 11:00 and slept through cough free until 5:00 the next morning (when I woke up coughing). I reapplied and went back to sleep until 8:00. No kidding, I couldn't believe it worked.
My husband thought it sounded pretty unlikely. He said maybe I was getting better and I should try sleeping without it the following night. Others said it had to be the placebo effect and others told me they had done it for years and it worked every time. So the next night I tried no Vaporub. I took my cough medicine and went to bed. Within a few hours, I was up coughing again. I tried putting the Vaporub on my chest. It worked for about a half an hour before I was coughing again. I put the Vaporub on my feet again and slept through the rest of the night cough free.
The last couple of nights I haven't needed it. I wake up coughing from time to time, but go back to sleep without trouble. Does the Vaporub on the bottom of your feet really work? Is it the placebo effect? I don't know nor do I care. It may have been all in my head, but I slept and that was good enough for me. The only way to know for sure is to try it on my son next time he has a bad cough (without telling him what it's for).
I just thought I'd post this so that the next time you are up coughing and desperate for sleep, you can try it too. If you do, please share the results. It would be interesting to see what others say.

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